TATAs
have stopped the work at the factory and announced the possible pull-out
due to violence and uncertainty. They have stopped the work and so
have their ancillary units.

WB Government
has requested the state Governor to intervene in the matter.

Mamta Banerjee of Trinamool Congress has announced the pull-out to
be an internal matter of TATAs.

Media and
industry is talking about the NANO car, its "great features and
price points", "the setback to the industry", "the
respect of the country in the world as an investment destination",
"the investment environment", "faith of the investors
in West-Bengal" etc.

No one
is talking about the future of the farmers whose land has been forcibly
taken-over by the WB Government and handed over to the TATAs.

No one
is talking about the moral and Governmental responsibility of the
WB Government towards its citizens-farmers whose land is supposed
to be the base on which the Billion $ empire of Tatas will get a push-forward.
The fact the progress of the state cannot be at the cost of livelihood
and lives of these farmers and the future of their families.

No one
is talking about the Corporate Responsibility of Tatas, who, are said
to be pioneers in the area of Corporate Responsibility.

The current
players in the issue are :

1. Farmers
whose future is at stake (& thus the future of the state's growth);

2. The
WB Government, who, though known for its Land-reforms program is not
bent on snatching the livelihood of the farmers just to increase its
GDP figure;

3. Mamta
Banerjee of Trinamool Congress who is supporting the farmers who have
declared that their land has been taken-away forcibly by the Government.

4. TATAs
who are bent on playing the victim, forgetting their role and their
Corporate Social Responsibility

The Humanist
proposal in this situation :

1. First
of all, this project should not have been brought to this situation.
The WB Government's view that making of a car in India is more important
than helping improve the farmers' lives goes against their own ideology
and experience of governing the state for over 3 decades. They as
well as all the state Governments alongwith Central Government should
declare that no project will be brought henceforth on Agricultural
land, except if it is a cooperative based project involving the land-owners
as equal and responsible partners.

2. Since
the project has progressed thus far, a truly participative meeting
of the stake holders can take place (Farmers, Government, Opposition,
Tatas) to explore these possibilities :

That the
land owners are paid a 80% of the price of land based on not the Government
fixed price but a market price that the company would have paid if
they had to negotiate and pay the price on their own to the farmers.
The fair price is estimated to be 3 to 6 times of that paid to the
farmers.

The farmers
be paid the same amount (80% as mentioned above) in the form of share-holding
in Tata Sons (that owns all the Tata companies) as a long-term investment
with conditions not to be able to re-sell it for atleast 3 years.

Tatas to
open schools, colleges and ITI (of a level with which the TATA name
can get attached) to take care of free-equitable-compulsory education
of all the children of all the farmers whose land is involved in this
project. Tatas are said to be known to be pioneers in the matter of
Corporate Social Responsibility. It is time that Ratan Tata himself
steps forward and create an example for other Industrialists to follow.
He can take it as a personal responsibility to ensure that the future
of the children of each of the families is guaranteed to be safe and
secure.

This can
help create an environment where all the stake-holders sit across
the table and following the principal of "Treat others as you
would have them treat you", reach a conclusion that would be
of benefit to all the stake-holders. We request the Honourable Governor
of West Bengal to initiate the reconciliation process based on this
principal.

Incase
a solution, primarily based on the interest of the livelihoods of
farmers is not possible, the Government has no right to declare a
private project to be a matter of public interest and act on behalf
of private industries. The poorest people must be the first and top-priority
interest of the Government.

People
are well aware of the "Government's public interest" and
will not become the victim of false propaganda. We know what happend
to the Maruti project for which the land was grabbed similarly and
finally the successful company was sold off to a Japanese company
for a song. If the land owners were made the share holders of the
company, they would have actually benefited.

We are
also aware of the stringent pro-labour policies to which the same
Tatas have had to agree before being able to take over even the publicly
owned companies in the so-called "free market" economies
like the UK.

The time
has come for Indians to arise as per calls given by Vivekananda and
Gandhi in their respective times and work to re-build the Nation.

The Humanist
Party of India invites all citizens to join this selfless effort and
build the platform in each neighbourhood, working for a Humanist Nation
which can then grow to become the Universal Human Nation.

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